Chapter 5

The dank air from my workshop filled my nostrils as I descended the rickety wooden stairs. I entered the torture chamber I had lovingly created, my sanctuary of pain, where I could express myself freely without fear of repercussion. The dimly lit room featured an array of snapshots from my victims’ lives on one wall, while the other wall was adorned with a maze of computer monitors, each one showcasing the plethora of grotesque and disturbing content prevalent in the red rooms. The eerie sounds of their screams and cries accompanied the smell of damp concrete and iron, creating a symphony of suffering in the cavernous space.

I breathed in deeply, savoring the cocktail of misery and fear. The man before me, chained to the wall, was a doppelganger of my late father, a cruel reminder of what had transpired in my childhood. I eyed him with contempt, imagining the pain he had inflicted upon my mother, the abuse I had witnessed as a helpless child. In return, I will grant him the agony he deserves. I will make him suffer in ways he could never imagine.

The walls echoed their screams, the soundtrack of my life, a haunting reminder of the monster that had been my father. I caressed the knife in my hand, a gift from my father, symbolizing his legacy of torment, a painful inheritance that I was eager to pass on.

As I perused the recent feedback from my loyal following in my red room, my admiration for them grew. They understood my work, they embraced my torture, and they encouraged my desires. I readied myself, preparing for the next stage of my artistic expression, my opus of pain. The man shackled before me struggled, his eyes wide, his mouth gaping, his mind racing, desperately trying to understand. I paused to savor the terror etched into his face and then I resumed reading my followers’ suggestions with relish. The requests were varied and imaginative, but they all shared one common theme: pain.

These visions of torment were what spurred me, drove me. They were the fuel that kept the engine of my soul running. I closed my eyes and imagined the ways I could make my victim suffer, my mind both repulsed and titillated at the same time. I would not disappoint my fans, I would bring their fantasies to life, and I would become the focus of their obsession.

I opened my eyes and returned my attention to the man before me. His breathing was ragged, his pupils dilated, and his face slick with sweat. I ran my thumb over the cold metal of the knife, imagining the sensation of it slicing into his flesh, severing tendons, and ripping through muscles. I would be as gentle as possible, prolonging his suffering for as long as I could. I would extract every last drop of pain, fear, and helplessness from him.

My hand trembled with excitement as I eagerly held the knife, a wide smile lighting up my face as I lovingly touched the man’s cheek. He flinched away from my touch, the fear evident in his eyes, in his every movement. The time had come, I thought, the moment when the fabric of his world would be torn asunder, when the beast would be unleashed, and when his nightmare would truly begin.

With a sense of almost spiritual awe, I raised the knife and prepared to make my first incisions.

The blade bit into his flesh, but no blood flowed yet. I reveled in the smell of it, the metallic tang that signaled the beginning of the end for him. His screams resonated with me, becoming the addictive melody that fueled my unquenchable thirst.

“Do you feel it?” I asked, my voice a low purr as I watched his expression change from terror to a mix of pain and confusion. I angled the knife, now slicked with his blood, and made another cut, this time a little deeper. He screamed and thrashed, the chains rattling with every movement. I watched, my face expressionless, as he struggled, and I felt nothing. He meant nothing to me, save for a way to satisfy my growing hunger.

I had always been a man of many appetites. As a young boy, I had to fight for everything I wanted, and even then, it was never really enough. My mother was a kind woman, but she was weak, and my father… well, my father was a beast that I could never tame. I learned to hate him and to hate what he did to my mother and me. I promised myself that I would one day have the power and control to make people suffer as my father had made us suffer.

The years of hatred and bile that festered within me eventually formed a poison in my veins, and I became enraptured by a new, darker obsession. I found myself drawn to the shadows, to the world of the red rooms. There, in those dank, filthy basements and warehouses, I could be who I truly was, and no one would ever know. I became the creator, the Lord of Pain, and my followers worshipped me like a god.

Now, as I stood before a man who looked so much like my father, I felt a wave of satisfaction wash over me. The knife in my hand was a part of my father, and I had used it many times to inflict pain on those who deserved it. I was not a monster, not like him. I was an artist in darkness, a creator of pain. And now, I would finally take my revenge on the man who had stolen my childhood, who had turned me into the man I had become.

The man was whimpering now, his body broken and bleeding. I set the knife down and picked up a pair of pliers, gently spreading the wound I had made and pulling his flesh apart with a sickening squelch. “You’re going to experience something you’ve never felt before,” I said, my voice a sing-song taunt. “I’m going to make you wish you had died as a child, before you’d had a chance to grow into the monster you are now.”

I set the pliers down and picked up a blowtorch, the flame hissing and spitting like an angry cat. I held it close to the open wound, and the man’s screams grew louder as the flesh began to blacken and blister. I stood back to admire my work, a wide smile of satisfaction on my face. I was not a monster. I was a master craftsman, and this was my canvas.